Auditor General looking into controversial DND Relocation Program

Former lieutenant-general Andrew Leslie, whose $72,000 taxpayer-funded moving bill has become a political controversy, is shown on April 7, 2010. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Murray Brewster

With sudden attention squarely focused on a collection of former generals being criticized for excessive relocation expenses, the question of why the Department of National Defence would ever allow the expenses is surfacing.

Cost controls for the Forces’ Integrated Global Relocation Program are not news for the Conservatives. They were told back in 2006, less than a year into their first minority government, that there were problems with the program’s cost controls.

Three years later, they signed a fresh contract and declared the problem solved.

After this weekend, however, one has to wonder if it was.

In the past few days, questions have been raised as to why the government paid a nearly $40,000 bill to move a disgraced former brigadier-general to the United Arab Emirates. Nor has there been a public accounting of $47,000 in moving expenses for three officers who went from a military camp in Afghanistan to Ottawa, Kingston, Ont., and Halifax. Also, former lieutenant-general and star Liberal candidate Andrew Leslie’s $72,000 moving bill for going from one house in Ottawa to another house in Ottawa has come to light, a development Leslie attributes to a smear campaign.

The auditor general will review the department’s relocation costs in a pair of reports to be released this spring and fall.

Specifically, the reports will be looking at the procurement and provision of services in the $148,371,000 contract the Harper government gave in 2009 to Brookfield Global Relocation Services (formerly Royal LePage Global Services) to deliver the Integrated Global Relocation Program.

But as John Geddes noted in Maclean’s on Monday, this isn’t the first time the auditor general’s office has looked into it.

In response to an auditor general’s report in 2006, the then-minority Harper government promised to develop and implement a “comprehensive Performance Management Framework for the Canadian Forces Integrated Relocation Program.”

Because, according to that 2006 report, the department of national defence had “yet to establish basic internal controls for the expenditure of public funds for the program.”

It also hadn’t developed performance measures to demonstrate whether the program’s objectives were being met.

“…analyze a sample of Integrated Relocation Program transactions from previous years to assess the risk that amounts spent on the program do not comply with the policy or contractual terms and conditions. If amounts identified are significant, the extent of testing should be increased. If necessary, National Defence (Canadian Forces) should develop a strategy to recover funds.”

A spokesperson for the office of the auditor general said they didn’t follow up to see if the government made good on its commitments in the 2006 report.

“We have not done any follow-up audit work on Chapter 5—Relocating Members of the Canadian Forces, RCMP, and Federal Public Service. Please note it’s up to the departments and agencies to take corrective action to improve their management practices in response to our recommendations,” they wrote.

However, the government claimed its 2009 contract with Brookfield satisfied the auditor general’s recommendations.

That Defence Minsiter Nicholson is now asking the department to review the program in light of this weekend’s revelations would seem to suggest the department didn’t find anything amiss when it did as the auditor general asked and analyzed the sample of transactions.

This despite some costly moves to nearby locations taking place as far back as 2008.

All that said, the government continues to maintain the problem is about in-city moves.

“The policy was never intended to have taxpayers pay over $70,000 for Andrew Leslie or other generals to change houses within the same neighbourhood,” Julie DiMambro, Defence Minister Rob Nicholson’s Director of Communications wrote in an email to iPolitics.

It just isn’t clear yet why the government failed to pick this up earlier.